Written by :

Touchplan

Date:

December 21, 2021

The Touchplan Podcast Network Released Three New Shows

Voices of Construction

Hosted by our very own Noah Baker, Voices of Construction peels back the perceptions and gets to know the passionate people behind the titles in the construction industry. Check out one of our recent episodes where Noah speaks with a Senior PM who worked on a project in Antarctica!

Build. Lead. Succeed.

Brought to you in partnership with the National Association of Women in Construction, Build. Lead. Succeed. is a podcast that is dedicated to having real conversations about what it’s like for women in the construction industry.

Upping Your Game

Our newest podcast launched in November and is hosted by George Hunt. In this podcast, George discusses a range of topics surrounding one of the foundational elements of Lean: capability development. From operations methods to new technologies, Upping Your Game takes a look across the AEC industry and beyond to bring you how others are improving the way they work as well as helping develop others around them.

Voices of Construction, Build. Lead. Succeed., and Upping Your Game are available on Spotify, Apple Podcast, Stitcher, and SoundCloud. Be sure to check them out!

A Look At Our Client Case Studies

Lee Kennedy & Touchplan Help Teams Increase Productivity and Accountability with Partnership

Lee Kennedy Company is a full service construction firm providing feasibility analysis, pre-construction, construction management, and general contracting services to the Academic, Interiors, Healthcare/Life Sciences, Commercial Development, Historic Restoration, Hotel/Residential, and Retail markets.

“The relationship with Touchplan is outstanding. Our teams have worked well with Touchplan’s customer success team, and they have done a great job on how to best use the product while being extremely receptive to our feedback on how to make the product better,” says Joe Breen, Project Executive at Lee Kennedy.

ANDRES Construction – Helping to Build a New Downtown Dallas Neighborhood

Touchplan is being utilized by ANDRES Construction to build a new 650,000 SF20- Story #residential tower with 335-units including penthouses on the top two floors, a pool overlooking the city, a private bar for tenants, and a rooftop deck. ANDRES is already complete with and ready to turn over the 180,000 SF of #office space and 25,000 SF of retail space. The residential tower is slated for completion in July of 2022.

Hoar Construction – Contributing to Urban Revitalization

Hoar Construction is a national GC primarily working in the Southeastern part of the US. They are also a mandated Last Planner System® (LPS®) company that sees significant value in using the Last Planner System®, and because of that have used it on every project across Hoar Construction.

“Our use of Touchplan on this apartment project allows us to have a good connection with everyone on the team and foster collaboration while not taking away from the value of pull planning the traditional way,” said Hoar Superintendent Andy Shonnard. “The Touchplan customer success team supports our projects on the front end and quickly gets the whole team onboarded. I knew I could count on them to get us up and running as fast as possible and make sure it was an effective tool for us to use.”

XL Construction – Building Better for Their Community

Touchplan was recently utilized by XL Construction on a very special project that created a new transitional housing facility for LifeMoves that will provide assistance for 100 displaced residents in Silicon Valley.

“Helping our communities is so important, especially during these trying times, and what XL Construction along with LiveMoves is creating will truly impact a lot of people,” said Milenko Dugorepec, Project Manager.

The Demo Company – Taking Human Capital Management to the Digital Space

Our friends at The Demo Company needed a digital option to organize their project teams and foremen, and they found the solution with Touchplan! Chase Resentes explains how they are using Touchplan to keep track of their projects and people.“

We wanted a software that was a quick visual, and we wanted something that could be organized according to project teams (headed up by a foreman that runs each project), and we wanted whatever it was to be super simple,” says Chase Rezentes, The Demo Company, LLC.

Sundt Construction – New Housing In Time for the Fall Semester

Touchplan was proud to be utilized by our clients at Sundt Construction as they built Hornet Commons, a new, 6-building, student housing project at California State University at Sacramento, and had it completed in time for the start this fall semester. You can read about the project in our latest case study. Congrats to Sean Falvey and the team at Sundt.

“We started with a rather detailed Excel program, but the challenge was that it became rather complex to use, and only the person who created it knew all of its inner workings,” said Falvey. “Touchplan was a great fit for this project as we have a lot of production work, and Touchplan makes it much easier to track all of it,” said Sean Falvey, Project Executive at Sundt Construction.

Orbiz – A Partnership to Further Construction Technology

Headquartered in Melbourne, Australia, and London, UK, ORBIZ is a specialist consulting firm that provides a broad range of performance improvement, project management and advisory services across the public and private sectors.

“We quickly realized that very few projects in Australia were using Last Planner®, never mind, a digital version like Touchplan. We saw an opportunity in the local market, to firstly, educate people on the power of the Last Planner System®, and using a tool like Touchplan to deploy it,” said Ross Sterland, CEO, ORBIZ.

McConnell Dowell – Helping to Bring Safer Roads in Australia

McConnell Dowell is the constructor and leader of the Western Program Alliance, delivering part of the Victorian State government’s ambitious level crossing removal program. The Alliance brings together the Level Crossing Removal Project, MTM (network operator), and Arup and Mott Macdonald as design partners.

“Occupations have to be planned to the “nth” degree, even before the project is awarded. We have thousands of people whose journeys are disrupted through road detours or needing to take replacement buses in-lieu of the train. Touchplan has allowed us to be better prepared,” said Phil Hendy, Innovations and Continuous Improvement Manager, Western Program Alliance.

Webinars Catered to Industry Professionals

The Risk of Using Spreadsheets to Manage Project Planning

In this webinar, George Hunt, met with a panel of seasoned industry professionals to explore the risks associated with using spreadsheets to manage project planning. The team discusses the issues they’ve experienced when using spreadsheets to manage their pull planning, look-ahead planning, and detailed production planning and the transition to using construction planning software.

Extreme Collaboration: Improvisation Meets Planning

Take a look at our webinar “Extreme Collaboration: Improvisation Meets Planning” below and hear Touchplan’s Andrew Piland explain how construction leaders can take ideas from “Getting to Yes and: The Art of Business Improv” to build buy-in and consensus across a team. Andrew presented this webinar to the LCI community as part of our LCI Congress 2021 promotion.

How Combining Technology Can Help You Lead a Jobsite

In this webinar, team members from Touchplan and OpenSpace meet to discuss how using a digital twin of your jobsite and collaborative production planning tool can help you become a more impactful leader.

It’s All About The Schedule: How Operationalizing Your Schedule Can Radically Improve Margins

While the fundamentals of Project Production Management (PPM) closely align to the reality of construction projects and the risks associated with them, PPM is far from being “the norm”. Understanding PPM can help teams effectively identify the often-overlooked risks that put projects and schedules in jeopardy. Practices, such as the Last Planner System® or Takt planning, are used by teams to better see the effect of the production laws on the flow of work, but are still underutilized throughout the industry. Learn more here.

Using Real-Time Analytics To Maximize Productivity

Jobsite productivity happens best when leadership can visualize analytics created in real-time by the daily plan. This type of detailed information, that is provided by Touchplan Insights, allows teams to receive reminders on project progress, quickly see which team members are keeping promises, and more easily diagnose the bottlenecks that cause variances in the schedule.

Why Your Master Schedule Needs Alignment With the Field

Without an integrated solution that connects the master schedule to field plans, most teams resort to inefficient workarounds.This leads to the risk of human error and poor communication between the field and the office, incurring delays, cost overruns, misaligned expectations, and less safe work environments. Check out the discussion here.

Quick Reads

What the World Needs Now: More Women in Construction Please

If you are looking for answers to the construction industry labor shortage, women can not only help you solve the problem, they very well could be the answer to it.

Revisiting the Five Big Ideas Transforming the Design and Construction Industry – A Blog Series

By 2010, the Five Big Ideas became the basis for a new kind of contract based on the relationships of the parties designing and building the project. So much has been learned since then.

Touchplan’s New Master Schedule Alignment Feature – A Product Manager’s Perspective

Hear from Sr. Product Manager Mary D’Arrigo about the development of the master schedule alignment and the value it will deliver to clients.

Touchplan Announces Record Growth, Executive Appointments

Capitalizing on record growth in 2020, Touchplan announced several appointments to its senior executive leadership team with an eye on global expansion.

So You Want to be a Superintendent…Thoughts from a Touchplan Team Member Who Worked in the Construction Industry

Andrew Piland takes us back to days as a superintendent for a major contractor and talks about how structure, with some added flexibility, can make the most of a jam-packed day on a construction site.

Tracking Progress for Repetitive Scopes Made Easier

Custom Fields is a great next step for teams who want to be able to stack up their planned throughput versus work in place.

How Make Ready Planning Can Make—or Break—Your Project

Invest the time and thought to get your schedule on track and you’ll see the results you want.

New Industry Alliances Working to Improve the Construction Industry

Nearly 40% of ENR 400 Contractors Rely on Bridgit and Touchplan for Their Construction Planning Needs

Bridgit, a leading construction workforce intelligence technology company, and Touchplan, an award-winning collaborative construction planning software platform that digitizes collaboration, planning, tracking, and communication on the jobsite, announced an exclusive partnership that will empower construction firms to better manage risk using a data-driven approach to project and workforce management, enabling greater productivity and profitability.

The Fastest Way to Create a Digital Copy of Your Construction Site

Touchplan recently formed a technology partnership with Oculo, a company that uses 360 cameras, state-of-the-art computer vision, and artificial intelligence to give a single source of truth for onsite construction progress. We sat down with Founder Tom Kotecki to learn more about the company’s technology and its impact on the construction industry.

Enhancing the Construction Process Via Next Evolution of The QR Code

Touchplan recently formed a technology partnership with BitRip, an adhesive tape that holds hundreds of ‘rippable’ codes that can store any cloud-based information on the spot. We sat down with CEO Nicholas Dimitruk to learn more about the company’s technology and its impact on the construction industry.

Touchplan’s Lean Coaching Affiliate Program Launched in October

Touchplan’s new affiliate program is designed to serve its customers’ needs and quickly connect them with high-quality Lean construction practitioners that can help with their transitions to managing construction projects with a Lean Mindset.

New Alliance to Assess Workflow and Reality Capture

Oculo, a leading AI and deep-tech company, and Touchplan, an award-winning collaborative construction planning software, announced a partnership to work together to assess a workflow that combines look-ahead planning with reality capture.

How Combining Construction Technology Can Help You Lead a Jobsite

Experts from Touchplan and OpenSpace discuss the value of combining contech to help lead a jobsite with insights provided by Corrie Neuens and Sarah Tenpas from The Boldt Company.

Managing Schedule Risks and Their Ripple Effects

Lauren Lake, COO and Co-founder of Bridgit, spoke with Andrew Piland about minimizing the ripple effect of schedule risks. Andrew is a former superintendent and is currently the Strategic Partnerships Lead at Touchplan, a leader in risk management technology for construction. Lauren and Andrew discussed how using the right tools can help mitigate schedule risks, and help improve your bottom line.

A Look at Touchplan Features & Testimonials

Real-Time Construction Project Insights

Owners and construction executives have the ability to review accurate, real-time project metrics all the way down to the field level, enabling them to proactively manage scheduling risks on a single project or across an entire portfolio.

Ease of Use Improves Efficiency During The Construction Process

We believe that learning from data is the key to making a construction process more efficient and it all starts with an intuitive, easy-to-use platform built with trades to owners in mind.

Long-Range Planning Maps Project Expectations Efficiently

Before the work begins, Touchplan’s virtual planning wall allows you to efficiently map out, see, and capture a full, long-range picture of how you and the team will meet the expectations of the project.

Look-Ahead Planning Aligns Your Team and Provides Accountability

As projects progress and plans change, look-ahead planning keeps all team members aligned, accountable and able to deliver on time as expected.

Maintain Alignment Between Overall Construction Project Expectations and Day-to-Day On-Site Activity

Touchplan construction collaboration software enables teams to maintain construction project alignment and eliminate the negative outcomes that come from the disconnect between the master schedule and detailed look-aheads.